Brand Update : Fastrack

Youth brand Fastrack is expanding itself into retail business by starting exclusive Fastrack showrooms across the country. Together with the retail foray, the brand is also extending itself into accessories like belts,bags,wallets and wristbands.

My first reaction was that " Is this brand crazy ? "

Why should a brand like Fastrack enter into retail business when the entire retail industry is facing a downturn ?

Personally I am a bit scary about the concept of Brand Extension. Fastrack which is predominantly a watch brand has earlier extended to sunglasses. That extension worked well because there was a significant gap existing which was tapped through that extension.

Let us take a look at the two major decisions taken by Fastrack.

The first decision is the extension towards accessories like belts, bags and wristband. The logic behind this extension is that the target market uses these products and all these categories are dominated by unbranded products.

It is true that there are no national brands in these categories except for the bags where there are players like VIP and Samsonite. But there is no brand targeting the youth even in the bag segment. Regarding the belts and wrist band, there are no known players. So the brand managers may have thought that Fastrack can tap these markets by leveraging its brand equity among the youth.

But do Fastrack have the competence and expertise to make and market these products ? Obviously the brand will outsource the production and act as the marketer. But selling bags and belts are different from selling watches. Both are different product categories which need differen expertise. By extending itself into categories which are not even related will defenitely dilute the Fastrack brand.

Another reason for this extensions is to develop Fastrack as an accessory brand rather than restricting itself to watches and sunglasses. Although it sounds good, my concern is whether Fastrack has sufficient equity that support such an extension. I feel that the brand is moving too fast without developing a proper foundation.

No doubt that the brand is popular among the youth but the brand has not reached the pinnacle from where it could confidently extend itself. It has not reached the level of Nike or Reebok from where they could leverage the equity to unrelated categories.

The second decision of the brand is to enter the retailing business. This is the most alarming part of the brand's latest moves. From a product brand to a retailing brand is not a wise decision at all. I was initially wondering why a brand should do a forward integration like entering retailing.

For Fastrack, I think there are two reasons.

The first reason is the brand's decision to diversify into accessories. Fastrack's accessories cannot be sold through opticians and watch showrooms. Hence the decision to retail venture is largely driven by the brand extension rather than marketing sense.

Another minor reason is that exclusive retail stores acts as brand building tools since the brand will be able to showcase all the products and marketing tools at its stores.

But I strongly think that Fastrack will lose its focus through these decisions. Retailing is a different business that requires different skill sets. It is an expensive venture that needs different management skillsets. and lot of financial commitments. Fastrack will have to spent lot of its management time in developing and maintaining these stores which should have been used by it for developing its core business

Fastrack have not learned from the Peter England brand's foray into retailing. Peter England had started a retail venture - Peter England People with the same objectives. Now reports say that the company is rethinking this venture because it has not taken off as expected.

Related Brand
Fastrack

Tanishq : Revitaliser of Tradition

Brand : Tanishq
Company : Titan Industries
Agency : Lowe Lintas

Brand Analysis Count : 382

Tanishq is a very interesting brand. Interesting because it is a brand that is trying to change the rules of an industry which is very fragmented. Tanishq is one of the first brands to create a national brand in the Rs 40,000 crore Indian Jewelery market.

The Indian jewelery market is huge and India is the second largest consumer of gold trailing behind USA. But the jewelery market is highly fragmented. The branded jewelery segment is hardly 5% of the total market.

Tanishq was launched in 1995. Since then , the brand has grown to a Rs 1200 crore brand even overtaking Titan watches interms of the turnover.
Tanishq is a retail brand. It is the chain of jewelery shops set up by Titan across the country. According to the company website, Tanishq has more than 104 stores across 71 cities. The chain is operating through a franchise system.

Titan has also another brand of retail outlets which is known as Gold Plus which is targeting the urban/semiurban consumers and small towns. Gold Plus has presence in more than 20 towns and Titan is planning a major expansion of these stores.

Titan planned to venture into gold business way back in late 1980's. During that period of foreign exchange crisis, a good way to earn the valuable foreign exchange was through gold business. But by the time the company figured out the business, the foreign exchange problem was over.

Although the jewelery market is large, doing business in this segment is not a cake walk. The market is complex and highly unorganized. The consumer behavior is also different compared to what we see in other products and categories.

Consumers tend to see gold as an investment and indulgence. Most of the individual consumers are loyal to their local jeweler /goldsmith. And for a brand like Tanishq, it had to break this traditional consumer buying process and also make them switch their loyalty from the goldsmith to the retailer.

In the state of Kerala where I live, the market is more organized. There are large chain of jewelers who have their presence across the state. Consumers tend to buy from these retail chains rather than make the gold jewelery from a gold smith.

Tanishq started off selling 18 carat gold jewelers. The brand at that time was positioned as a jewelery for daily wear . But the brand ran into difficulties since the consumers were too sticky about 22 carat ornaments. The light weight jewelery was still alien to the consumers.

Tanishq was depending heavily on the pull factor. The brand relied on the design ranges, the trust that the Tata brand carries and also the reliability factor.
One of the major hurdles that the brand faced was the brand recognition during its initial stages. People did not know about the Tanishq brand . Since gold is a high value- high involvement purchase, consumers were risk averse in trying out a new retail format like Tanishq. The consumers were also less responsive to the premium that Tanishq jewelery commanded.

It takes lot of time to change the consumer perception. It is harder if this behavior is rooted in tradition. Gold retailing is heavily rooted in tradition. If we look at the genesis of local jewelers, most of them have a long tradition and their business and clientele has been built over generations.
Since the pricing of gold jewelery is tricky and complex, consumers also tended to rely on their traditional store rather than experimenting with new stores.
But these have changed in recent times. The stores has been exploiting the consumers by complex pricing policies like " making charges", value addition etc which an ordinary consumer seldom understand.Tanishq has been trying to tap on this need for a honest gold retailer.

Along the way , the brand also had to fight the perception of being a premium brand. In a classic case of over positioning, the brand had to convince the consumer that Tanishq had jewelery which was affordable. Over positioning is where the brand narrowly positions itself and consumer tend to have a narrow image of the brand.

To tide over this issue, Tanishq came out with small priced collections which to an extend corrected the perception problem.
According to the company website, Tanishq had a turnover of over Rs 1200 crores.

The brand is very active across the media. Tanishq have a two prong branding strategy. The company have the main brand Tanishq and lot of sub brands for its different collections. Some of these brands are Solo, Aria, Diva , Collection G etc.
Tanishq recently roped in the new Bollywood diva Asin to endorse a collection.To tide over the issue of low margins, Tanishq has recently launched the diamond collection which is considered to be a high margin product line.
Tanishq has been trying to differentiate on the designs. It had built lot of product lines and has branded these lines. The brand feels that consumers will chose Tanishq for its designs.

Regarding the promotional strategies, Tanishq have the major issue is fighting the regional players. Consider the Kerala example, the brand Tanishq have zero visibility compared to the local jewelery chains. The local jewelers of kerala are advertising freaks and one of the largest spenders in print and visual media in the state.
Jewelers in Kerala have roped in most of the famous models and divas for their campaigns. Even ex-bollywood divas like Sridevi Jayaprada and Hemamalini are endorsing some of the Kerala Jewelers.

The jewelery business works in a different way. The business works like this. Most of the jewelers does not make these jewelleries. They are mere traders. They buy the designs from the jewelery makers and then display them and sell them on a mark-up. Most of the makers supply to all retailers hence retailers stock similar designs thus making this a commodity trading business with little scope of differentiation.

These jewelery chains then spend heavily on building their brands and luring the consumers . Now the stores are so desperate that they have sales executives who are canvasing the bride's parents. Marriage is the event where maximum gold purchases are done by the consumers. You cannot built volume in gold business by ignoring the marriage segment. And this segment is witnessing a dog-eat-dog competition . Gifts, referrels, discounts rule this segment. I am not sure whether Tanishq is geared up for such a volume business.

Among this noise, Tanishq is virtually non-existent. I think, this is the case in most of the states. Hence if Tanishq have to capture the market, it will have to take the brand promotion to the local market. Since the brand is operating on a franchise model, it will have difficulty in localizing its brand promotional activities. I do not remember any campaign which is highly memorable for this brand. In this business, one has to have a higher share of mind and share of voice in order to be successful.

The brand also faces the issue of flucutating gold prices. The concept of a fixed MRP in gold jewellery will not work and usually the mark-up and other charges vary with seasons and demand. When you are operating on a national scale, these issues makes the operations very complex. Jewelery business has not become a commodity business and margins also have come down drastically.

When Tanishq launched the everyday -wear, it was a concept that was ahead of its time. But I feel that the younger generation is now opening up to the concept of such a collection. The ballooning gold prices are also an opportunity for Tanishq to rejuvenate such a line of jewelery.

Tanishq has reached a position from where it can scale up the business to the next level . The brand has to localise its promotional campaigns which will inturn make the brand more visible among the local consumers.

Brand Update : Fastrack

This January, Fastrack has launched a new range of wrist gear and eyegear branded as the Army collection. The new series of rugged looking accessories is inspired by the military equipment and weapons.

The watches and sunglasses have a gun-metal finish and looks rugged and cool.

The launch of Army collection is a smart marketing move. The launch coincides with the recent Mumbai attacks and the Indian Public is filled with admiration towards the valor and commitment displayed by the security forces during these terror attacks. Knowingly or unknowingly, the army collection will greatly benefit from this current positive vibes towards the Indian armed forces.

The Army collection of watches and sunglasses are priced upwards from Rs 1400 to Rs 3500.
As a consumer, I have a doubt whether the brand is pricing itself out.

Fastrack is a brand that is targeting the youngsters. And as we know youngsters are on a limited budget and they look for fashion statements which are affordable. Here I am talking about the large section of middleclass consumers.
Fastrack had been a huge hit among the young consumers owing to their smart pricing and also careful branding.

But I have a feeling that Fastrack is slowly raising its prices and losing its pricing advantage. Look at the latest Army Collection. The prices starts with Rs 1500 which is above the reach of those youngsters who are students and live on their monthly pocket money. We haven't moved into a situation where consumers splurge on watches and own multiple watches.

Hence the new collection with its aggressive pricing will definitely takes the charm out of this brand. The name Army Collection will definitely bring in lot of consumers but in my personal opinion, the price will definitely put off a large number of consumers.

Fastrack also lost an opportunity to make an emotional statement with this range. The brand could have touched the heart of millions by contributing a part of the sales from Army Collection to some welfare fund for Army men. This could have taken this brand to a higher platform and customers would have loved the brand for gesture.

Related Brand

Fastrack

Bajaj XCD : Positioning Problem ?

Brand : Bajaj XCD
Company : Bajaj Auto


Brand Analysis Count : 381

Bajaj XCD was launched in September 2007. The brand was expected to boost the fortune of Bajaj Auto and intended to give nightmares to the market leader Hero Honda.

XCD was a 125 cc motorcycle planned by Bajaj to pip the largest selling motorcycle brand Splendour. Indian twowheeler market is dominated by the 100 cc segment which constitutes around 60% of the total volume sold. Bajaj so far was not able to come out with a brand worthy of competing with Splendour . Its major challenger brand Discover , although was moderately successful failed to dethrone the Splendour.

XCD 125 was launched with much hype and fanfare. After Pulsar, everyone had high expectations over new product launches from Bajaj.

The launch ad for XCD 125 was a hi-fi ad which frankly I did not understand. The ad seemed to be expensive with lot of digital effects but conveyed nothing. May be the company wanted to position the brand as a hi-tech brand.

watch the launch ad here : XCD launch ad

Then came the down-to -earth campaigns for XCD. These campaigns were highly popular . The ads had two characters meeting at different places and the non-XCD owner getting pissed off at all these encounters.
Watch the campaigns here : XCD- Traffic signal
XCD Basement
XCD Showroom

The traffic signal advertisement was the most popular one and was really a cool ad. The characters were so popular that Sun Direct Digital TV used the same characters and theme for their commercial - watch here : sun direct

During this phase , XCD directly pitched against 100 cc bikes. Bajaj forecasted that over a period of time, 100 cc bikes will be replaced by more powerful 125 cc bikes. Since Bajaj had earlier failed to foresee the shift of consumer from scooters to motorcycles, it did not wanted the history to repeat itself.

So in a pre-emptive move, Bajaj launched the 125 cc brand XCD ahead of Hero Honda.

Hence, during the launch phase, Bajaj tried to convince the potential 100 cc bike customers to switch to 125 cc. These customers were in the middle-class segment and the price of these bikes were in the range of Rs 40,000- Rs 45,000.

In the campaigns, XCD tried to tell the consumers that 125 cc bikes are more powerful , fuel efficient and had lot of features like electronic start, LED lamps and digital speedometers that 100 cc bikes does not have.

More over the brand had the legendary DTS-Si engine which was proprietary technology from Bajaj.

Despite all these, the XCD failed to take-off. The company expected XCD to even overtake Pulsar interms of the sales volume. But after the initial spike, XCD failed to enthuse the market.

The first reason was the product failure. Immediately after the launch, there were reports on product problems and recall. Although there was no PR disaster, consumers were taken aback by the newspaper reports. ( report) The product also failed to deliver on the expectations generated by the advertisements regarding the mileage.

Another significant reason was the positioning issue. Bajaj XCD was destined to fight with Splendour . So through out the campaign , it wanted to establish the Points of Parity with Splendour and other 100 cc bikes.

But contrary to Bajaj's expectations, the consumers established Points of Parity of XCD with Pulsar. The main culprit was the ingredient brand DTS-Si. Since Bajaj XCD also had the DTSi technology, consumers expected the same level of performance with that of Pulsar.

Also consumers never put XCD 125 in the same category as 100 cc. Hence the comparison was with higher CC brands like Pulsar. Since XCD was no where near Pulsar, obviously consumers never was happy. Bajaj wanted to do a break-away positioning but the strategy failed.

Bajaj also confused the consumers by launching Platina 125 DTSI. Platina is the entry level brand and launching that brand with 125 cc engine killed any remaining prospect of XCD 125, since there is not much difference between the two brands except the price.

In 2009, Bajaj is trying a second luck with the XCD brand. In January , the company launched XCD 135 DTS-Si. The new variant is touted as India's first commuter sports bike.

The brand is currently running a television commercial in all channels : Watch it here

In my personal opinion, it is a lousy commercial which is a sheer waste of money. It is totally absurd and the idea is nothing new. I think some other brand had earlier advertised about the " one pillion rider " theme. Two girls fighting for a pillion ride is not a big ' aha' and the ad is too lengthy one which is a waste of money at this time of cash-crunch.

Here again Bajaj is trying to create a new category of bikes. The new XCD boasts of 5 speed gear box, front disc brakes, digital speedometers etc which is seen on the premium bikes. XCD also is powered with DTS-SI engine and is priced at Rs 45,000.

I don't think that Bajaj has learned from the mistakes from the failure of XCD 125. Here again the positioning of XCD is strikingly similar to Pulsar. Now the only difference between Pulsar and XCD is interms of engine power and price. Even the styling has become almost the same.

XCD 135 brand is again creating points of parity with Pulsar .I am sure that XCD will not match the power of Pulsar and those customers who expect the Pulsar's qualities in XCD are bound to be disappointed.

I don't understand why Bajaj has not been able to create a seperate identity for XCD rather than
keep its association with Pulsar. The advertising agency has also done the damage of creating a campaign which is strikingly similar to Pulsar campaigns by including the famous stunt called Stoppie where the biker lifts the rear wheel and balances using the front. .These stunts and visuals were trademarks of Pulsar ads.

Bajaj is also ignoring its best-selling Pulsar brand . It was not able to create new memorable campaigns for the flagship Pulsar and now they are messing up Pulsar by using same positoning platform for other bikes.

I have a feeling that Bajaj is now panicking because of the comeptition from Yamaha and Honda. In the Panic, it is creating strategies to boost short-term sales rather than investing for the long term. Brands take time to establish but Bajaj is trying to do things fast.

Having said that, the most important determinant of success in the two-wheeler segment is the product's performance. Splendour has been ruling the Indian roads on pure performance than anything else. If XCD 135 is able to create new benchmarks for performance, then there is nothing that can stop it from becoming successful - even lousy positioning cannot block its success.






Related Brand

Pulsar
Brand Update on Pulsar

Book Review : Outliers

Book : Outliers
Author : Malcolm Gladwell
Publisher : Allen Lane ( Penguin Books)


Price : Rs 399


Book review # 8

I bought this book with lot of expectations . I was thoroughly impressed by Malcolm Gladwell's previous books - The Tipping Point and The Blink.
The main motivation for me to buy this book was the " tagline" of the book. Gladwell marketed this book as one which will explain the story of success and honestly I fell for it.

I am disappointed .
Unlike the earlier creations, Outliers is nothing to write about. It is an ordinary and often a very boring read, except for the first two chapters. I found the book boring may be because I expected too much out of it. I knew that it was not a self- help book that will give you a step by step approach to success but I expected a hell lot of insights into those beautiful minds that created successes.

The author defines Outliers as those who have achieved extraordinary success in their lives.

As a reader, my only take-away from this book is his 10,000 hours rule. It is a remarkable insight and may be that single insight makes the money spent on this book worthwhile.
The ten thousand hour rule is simple
If you want to be a genius in a chosen field , you have to put in 10,000 hours of practice/study.

That is it...

This is not a new insight . We all knew that hardwork is essential and hardwork = success equation has become a cliche. But nobody has put a quantitative benchmark to the amount of hardwork needed to become a success.
Malcolm Gladwell did a great service by putting a magical number to hardwork. I thank him for that. Now I can tell my daughter and students about the quantum of work they have to put in to become a genius.

To my surprise, after giving away a powerful insight, Gladwell tried to undo and negate this 10,000 rule in the rest of the chapters. By quoting outdated examples , Gladwell tried to establish that external circumstances play the major role in shaping outliers. So effectively he says that even if you put in 10,000 hours of study , you may not become an outlier ????????

Then he goes on proving his contradictions with examples from history and most of the examples were alien to me.

But in the marketing point of view, this book was marketed well. There will be lot of readers like me who may have bought this book thinking that Gladwell will reveal the secret key to success....
and the message given to us by the author was :

fool... try working hard.. nobody has become successful by reading a book...

Tamariind : RIP ( 2001-2002)

Brand : Tamariind
Company : Skumar's
Agency : Percept

Brand Analysis Count : 380

Tamariind was a brand which died inside the TV Tube. This much hyped brand had only one year of existence in the Indian market.

Tamariind was the readymade brand from the textile major S Kumar's Ltd. The company wanted to tap the emerging readymade segment . Tamariind was targeting the middle and upper-middle class segment.

Tamariind had a dream launch. The brand had roped in Hrithik Roahan who was at that time was a phenomenon. I think Tamariind was one of the first textile brands to take him as the brand ambassador.

Riding on the pulling power of Hrithik Roshan, Tamariind had a huge brand recall during the launch. Infact the ads were so effective that large retail chains were stocking this brand within a few days of launch.

How ever, the euphoria did not last long . For some strange reasons, the brand was dead in no time. In 2002, the brand was out of the retail shelves.

Tamariind was positioned as a fashion wear. The clothes were designed by the famed London based designer John Paul Vivian. The brand had the tagline " The Flavour You Wear ". The brand was designed to be a fun,fashionable trendy brand.
Tamariind was also brought in the concept of Total Wardrobe Solutions by providing all type of clothing to the target consumer.


Initially the company planned to use the brand name Cinnamon for its readymade venture. But a retail chain having the same brand name moved to court and restrained SKumars from using Cinnamon. That caused the company to come up with the new brand name -Tamariind.

So here is a brand which had a trendy name, a big star, an international designer and a reputed company ...... and how come such a brand fail that too so fast ?
I personally think that three major factors was the cause of this brand's failure.
Price and
Distribution and
Differentiation.

Price was the critical issue in this case. Tamariind was steeply priced and this repelled many potential customers . Those who bought the brand could not be convinced about the quality which did not justify the steep price.

The brand also tried to focus more on exclusive outlets which again severely restricted its reach among the audience.

Tamariind spend around Rs 12 crore on the launch promotions but could not sustain or convert the initial hype into sales. The brand ambassador Hrithik also faced so many flops after the initial success which inturn affected the brand negatively.

Other than the brand ambassador, Tamariind has nothing to talk about. The product did not have a meaningful differentiation that could justify its high price. When a brand is aiming at the premium class, the product should have some meaningful qualities that will justify the premium. A mere presence of a celebrity will not create a sustainable value for the product .

Print ad source : afaqs
PS : Tamariind brand has two "i" s and is not a spelling mistake.